


The Scottish Play

by luladannys



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: F/F, F/M, high school theater au, special cameo character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-08
Updated: 2015-12-10
Packaged: 2018-05-05 14:30:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5378573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luladannys/pseuds/luladannys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Flynn is stage manager and Eve is Lady Macbeth in their school's production of Shakespeare's famous tragedy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Act I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by what Flynn and Eve said in the Broken Staff about both having been theatre kids. It's been on my mind ever since.

Flynn Carsen was jostled around by the swarm of students crowded around the piece of paper on the theater bulletin board. He had a knot of excited anxiousness in his stomach, knowing that he had _killed_ the audition. Had any of these other kids studied Shakespeare as intently as he had? No. Had any of them had their mothers make a costume just for tryouts? No. This was in the bag for Flynn. He had never felt so sure of anything.

His school counselor had been hounding him all that year so far about extracurriculars because, apparently, colleges cared about more than just grades, which Flynn thought was ridiculous. But the lead in a school Shakespeare production would surely look good on applications and would be easy for him. He had been reading Shakespeare since the fourth grade, after all.

“Yes!” Sam Denning shouted from the front of the cluster. “You are looking at your new Macb-”

“ _SHH!_ ” the others hissed. One even clapped their hand over his mouth.

Flynn couldn’t believe it. _Sam_ , who didn’t even know he shouldn’t utter the name of the play inside the theater, was the lead? He was already a star on the baseball team. Why did he have to have this, too?

Even though Sam hadn’t said the whole word, many of the kids ran out of the side door to complete the cleansing ritual – spinning three times, spitting over their left shoulder, and reciting a line from one of Shakespeare’s other plays. Flynn thought the whole superstition was rather silly. It seemed he wasn’t the only one, either. A handful of students seized the opportunity to look at the cast list while most of the crowd was gone.

A freckly girl with short red hair named Morgan showed her joy at being cast as the first witch by letting out a terrifyingly good cackle. Flynn had been in school with Morgan since kindergarten and had to admit that that was perfect casting for the girl who used to kick him in the shins with her light-up Barbie sneakers for fun. Then there was only one person left in front of him – a girl with wavy blonde hair that went to her shoulders wearing an oversized blue plaid flannel. Her black backpack hung off of one shoulder, moderately worn.

“Hm,” was all she said as looked at the sheet of paper.

Then she hitched her backpack up and walked away.

Flynn stepped up and ran his finger down the list, looking for his name. He already knew he hadn’t been cast as the titular character, so maybe…

Not Macduff. Not Banquo. Not King Duncan. Not even a servant!

He double-checked, just to be sure. He wasn’t there at all.

Wait…

On the very bottom of the sheet, below all of the characters, there was something else written.

_Stage Manager … Flynn Carsen_

“Stage manager?” Flynn read aloud. “Stage manager? That’s not a character!”

The rest of the students were returning from outside now. He left the board and marched off to the office of the drama teacher, Mrs. Ford. She had her feet up on the desk, showing off heels that certainly no one on a teacher’s salary could afford, and was balancing a stack of papers on her legs as she graded them. She did everything with a flourish, even scrawling notes on her students’ assignments with an elegant wave of her hand as she muttered about how little they knew about the art of the stage.

Flynn cleared his throat and Mrs. Ford readjusted herself properly in her seat.

“Ah, my stage manager!” she greeted in her smooth English accent.

She had been awaiting his arrival to her office. There were always students who were very passionate in their auditions, but…well, just not very good. Mrs. Ford sympathized with those kids greatly and always gave one the job of stage manager.

“About that,” Flynn said. “I don’t understand why I wasn’t cast in an actual role. I was more prepared than anyone.”

“Yes, you were, which is why I gave you a much more important role than any member of the cast.”

Flynn frowned in confusion. Mrs. Ford stood and put her hands on his shoulders.

“You are the organization behind the entire show, Flynn. You are in charge of the prompt book.”

“What’s a prompt book?”

“ _What’s a prompt book?_ It’s only the bible of the show!” She picked an empty binder up off of her desk. “This will be filled with all of the cues – actors, lighting, music – and it is your responsibility.”

“So I don’t get to be in the play -”

Mrs. Ford began to interrupt him with a pitying look on her face, but he continued on.

“- I get to be in charge of the play? That’s even better. I like this better.”

“Well, _I’m_ the director. _I’m_ still in cha-”

He took the binder from her hands with a wide grin and left the office, his bulky backpack disappearing as he scurried off. Mrs. Ford was stunned still for a moment. She had never seen a student take the stage manager assignment so well.

* * *

On the first day of rehearsals, Flynn stood right beside Mrs. Ford as she went over everything. He was her shadow, which the teacher had thought was kind of cute at first, but she was a bit of a pacer as she talked and kept bumping into the boy as he tried to follow her around. Finally, the director just cut her speech short and ushered her two leads onto the stage to start by reading Act II, Scene II.

The girl that Flynn had seen at the cast list followed Sam up the steps onto the stage, tucking her blonde hair behind one ear. Her clunky black Dr. Marten’s _thud_ ded heavily against the scuffed wood of the stage. Flynn had studied the cast list and knew now that her name was Eve Baird. She swallowed and mostly looked at either the script in her hands or at her feet as they prepared to read the scene. She couldn’t really be blamed for being nervous, especially after Mrs. Ford’s passionate words about now important and famous of a character Lady Macbeth was and sharing that she had once played her.

“Action!” Mrs. Ford exclaimed, only for the boy next to her to be a delayed repeat. “Hold on,” she said to the actors and leaned over to Flynn, whispering, “ _I_ say action, not you.”

Flynn nodded and scribbled down a note: _Don’t say “action”._

Mrs. Ford declared action again and Eve began to read, her voice rather monotone but not quavering or stuttering in the slightest. Sam read his lines gallantly, even though in that particular scene his character was not feeling that way. Flynn switched back and forth between watching them and watching the reactions of the woman beside him. She had her elbows on the armrests, hands clasped together beneath her chin, and her expression was unreadable.

“What are we thinking right now?” he asked her, gesturing to the stage.

Mrs. Ford sighed. “We are thinking you should go check in on the techies.”

Flynn nodded and headed backstage. Mrs. Ford rubbed her temples as he left. This kid was going to drive her absolutely mad.

* * *

Nearly three weeks into rehearsals, Flynn was trying to find a quiet place to spend their half hour meal and homework break so that he could work on his notes in the prompt book. The classroom and the backstage area were both in use by the other students, who had broken up into smaller cliques and groups that Flynn was not welcome in, so he went into the house.

He was surprised to see Eve seated on the edge of the stage and his face must have shown it.

“You gonna tell on me?” she asked.

“I… What?”

“For eating in here?”

He hadn’t even noticed it until she mentioned it. He shook his head.

“You’re not as much of a douche as everyone thinks you are, then,” Eve said with a quirk of her lips and ripped a piece off of her Honey Bun to stick in her mouth.

Flynn shifted on his feet. He had been called many things by his peers over the years, but he was pretty sure “douche” had never been one of them.

“Why are you in here?” he asked her.

She shrugged. “I just like to be alone, I guess.”

Flynn nodded and started to turn around. He could get his work done up in the booth so that she could have her space.

“But I wouldn’t mind if you wanted to hang out in here. It’s not like I own the theater or anything.”

So he sat down as well, though several feet away from her, and opened his book. But he couldn’t concentrate with the crinkling of Eve’s pastry wrapper and the sound her bottle of Gatorade made as she opened and closed it. Mrs. Ford’s number one rule was _NO EATING IN THE HOUSE_ and he was supposed to be enforcing those rules, but apparently doing his job made him a douche. His mother had seemed so hopeful about him making friends through joining the theater, but he didn’t even belong here with group of kids seen as the weirdest of them all.

“What is that thing?” Eve asked, rousing him from his thoughts.

“The prompt book. It has everything about the play in it. Mrs. Ford says calls it the bible of the show.”

“Cool. Can I see it?”

Before he could answer, she had slid herself the four feet or so off of the stage onto the floor and came to stand next to his dangling legs. She leaned over to look at the binder full of his meticulous notes and he couldn’t help but inhale the scent combination of her perfume and sweat. The stage lights were hot and she had earlier taken off her gray flannel and tied it around her waist, leaving her in a burgundy tank top. Her short hair was pulled into a tiny ponytail that was a little frizzy from the heat.

“Wow, this is…in-depth,” Eve commented after a moment of flipping through the pages, then pointed at something. “Why does this say: _Morgan McCabe – DO NOT make eye contact!_?”

“Has she ever made eye contact with you while she’s performing? It’s scary.”

“Do you have notes like this for everyone?”

“Yeah,” Flynn answered, not realizing where she was going with her line of questioning.

Then she snatched the book from his lap and set it on the stage so she could look at it easier. She scanned the pages he had titled _Actor Notes_ until she found her name. That was all that was there. Her name.

_Eve Baird –_

“You don’t have any notes for me? I’m kind of offended.”

Flynn scratched the back of his head. “I mostly write constructive criticisms in there to tell Mrs. Ford about later and I, uh, I haven’t come up with any for you yet.”

“ _Yet_ ,” Eve repeated with a grin.

She went back through the names until she found: _Sam Denning – Over-acts, Forgets blocking, Eyebrows_

“Eyebrows?”

“When he’s acting, his left eyebrow always arches a good inch higher than his right one. It’s really weird. I can’t believe you haven’t noticed it.”

Eve’s head tilted to the side a little bit and she smiled, about to say something, but then the door to the classroom opened the rest of the actors started coming in. Break was over. She handed him back the binder and stretched her arms up above her head before returning to the stage, a half-inch of midriff peeping out from between the hem of her tank top and the top of her jeans. Flynn scrambled away and into his seat to watch the rest of rehearsals.

While Macbeth and his wife were plotting to murder King Duncan, laughter bubbled over out of Eve’s mouth right into Sam’s face. She put her hand over her mouth and turned aside for a moment to regain her composure, then apologized to Mrs. Ford and moved on.

“I hate you for pointing out the eyebrow thing to me,” she said to Flynn as she passed him on the way out.

Flynn watched as she unchained her bike from the rack and rode off, the shirt around her waist floating behind her. He had made a girl laugh and it wasn’t even _at_ him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm expecting a majority of you to pick up on the special guest character. ;)


	2. Act II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Something I forgot to note on the first chapter -- I always imagine teenage Eve as a total grunge girl.

“ _OW!_ ” Eve exclaimed as she was stuck with a pin.

“Sorry, sorry,” the redheaded costumer squeaked through the pins she was holding between her lips.

Eve sighed and stood as still as possible on the wobbly crate that was being used as a pedestal for the costume crew to avoid any more pinpricks. Her arms were getting tired from holding them out at her sides like the girl working on her dress had asked her to. From the other side of the backstage tech workshop, she noticed Flynn and flicked her eyes over, keeping her pose on the crate.

She couldn’t hear what he was saying, but he was clearly chewing the set crew out for something. He kept pointing at the clipboard he had taken to carrying around in the last few days holding the schedule for when things for the show were supposed to be completed. When he was finished with them and turned to head over to the prop crew, the set kids flipped him off behind his back.

Eve’s body slacked with a feeling of pity for him and another pin poked her in the waist, immediately causing her to hiss in pain and regain her statuesque stance. The costumer apologized again, almost hysterically, and Eve told her that it was okay.

“I didn’t even want to work in costumes,” the girl muttered under her breath. “Stupid headaches from the lights.”

“That guy sure is a piece of work, huh?” Sam said from a similar position to Eve’s a few feet away, gesturing towards Flynn with a movement of his chin.

“He has a lot of responsibility,” Eve said, feeling the need to defend him. “He takes his job very seriously.”

“He’s like a drill sergeant or something, always bossing everybody around. It’s annoying.”

Eve set her jaw and did not reply. His analogy did not sit well with her and she had to bite her tongue to avoid snapping at him.

“You’re done,” the costume girl said and Eve happily headed into the girls’ dressing room to change back into her regular clothes.

* * *

She didn’t know much about Flynn outside of theater. She was fairly certain he was a junior, too, but they didn’t have any classes together. With how often she moved schools, Eve was always placed in the most basic of classes, not honors or AP, and he seemed like someone who would be more advanced. She didn’t know why she thought about it so much. He was just…interesting.

For the past few days, she had been coerced by Sam and some of the other theatre kids to join them for lunch. She stayed quiet, knowing better than to try to make friends at this point. She made herself anonymous so that when the day came that she was suddenly gone, the group wouldn’t really notice.

Eve had been picking at her tray absentmindedly, not tuned into the conversation going on around her at all, until Flynn’s name coming out of Morgan’s mouth caught her attention.

“- carries it everywhere. I grabbed it from his bag during chem.”

She beamed proudly as she reached into her purple backpack and held up the prompt book for them all to see. The group laughed encouragingly and crowded around Morgan as she opened it, each spouting off ideas about what they could do to mess with it.

Eve leapt up from her seat, ignoring the peach syrup that splashed onto her shirt from bumping her tray, and slammed the binder back shut, holding her hand down on the top of it. She knew that Flynn had all kinds of notes about all of them inside of it and if they saw what he had written they would hunt him down.

“What’s the matter, Eve?” Sam asked.

“We shouldn’t go through this.”

“Why not?” Morgan demanded. “Flynn’s an asshole.”

A chorus of _yeah_ s came from throughout the table. Eve felt the tips of her ears heat up with indignation as she floundered for a response.

“You got a crush on him or something?” accused Morgan with a malicious smile.

“It has nothing to do with _him_ ,” Eve said quickly. “It’s about the show. This has everything important about the show in it, the show that _we_ are all in, so we should respect it.”

Everyone just stared at her for a moment, then Sam went and stood beside her.

“She’s right. Just because we hate Flynn doesn’t mean we should sabotage our own show.”

Being a sort-of leader of the group, the others were agreeing with Sam rather quickly. Morgan huffed and crossed her arms over her chest.

“Someone should turn that into Mrs. Ford,” Lamia said. “Tell her that they found it somewhere.”

“I’ll do it,” Eve offered.

She snatched the book off of the table, grabbed her bag, and tossed her lunch tray in the trash. As she marched off across the grass, a hand grabbed her elbow. It was Sam.

“I’ll come with you.”

She tried to protest, but he insisted. Eve hadn’t intended on actually turning it into Mrs. Ford. From what little she knew of Flynn, she knew that he had probably lost his mind over the missing prompt book and she had wanted to give it straight to him instead of the director so that he wouldn’t get in trouble for “losing” it.

Mrs. Ford was in the middle of a class when they got to the theater. The students were doing some weird acting exercises while the teacher walked amongst them. She spotted the visitors and went over to them.

“My stars,” she greeted. “What a lovely surprise.”

Eve held out the prompt book, but before she could say anything regarding it, Sam took over.

“We found this and knew that we should bring it to you immediately.”

Mrs. Ford looked shocked. “I cannot believe Flynn left this laying around. What irresponsibility. Thank you very much, you two.”

Sam smiled at the praise and said that it was the least he could do, like he was some kind of hero. It made Eve sick to her stomach. She wanted to tell Mrs. Ford the truth so badly. What did it matter if the others thought she was snitch? It was the right thing to do. But still, there was a part of her that, like any other teenager, just wanted to fit in and it kept her from opening her mouth. Surely Flynn wouldn’t get into any real trouble over this.

* * *

She felt awful as Flynn exited Mrs. Ford’s office later, shoulders drooping and gaze downcast. His voice was flat as he called attendance for that day’s rehearsals. He usually carried himself with a great deal of importance and while it hurt Eve to see him rather deflated that day, the others were quite pleased to see their stage manager knocked down a peg.

Eve found him outside during their break.

“Hey.”

He glanced over at her for a second and then went back to staring at the nearly empty school parking lot.

“Where did you and Sam _find_ it?” he asked after a moment, a bite to his voice.

Flynn had been ready to fight Mrs. Ford about having lost the book until she revealed who had brought it to her. He just nodded mutely for the rest of their conversation. For one thing, Mrs. Ford adored her two leads and Flynn never would have stood a chance at denouncing whatever they had told her. But he also felt kind of hurt. He had become rather numb to the overall taunting and cruelty he faced from the kids that he had grown up with, but hearing that Eve had been a part of this current plot against him had upset him and he wasn’t quite sure why. Sure, she had been nice to him that one day, but he shouldn’t have expected her to remain so. Everyone hated him or thought that he was weird. Eve should be no different, yet a little voice in the back of his mind told him that he thought she might have been.

He had credited a majority of his anger to the fact that it was Sam that she had worked with. The guy who had thrown Flynn’s shoes in the locker room shower one time in seventh grade, forcing him to wear soggy sneakers for the rest of the day and catch a cold. The guy who had heard that Flynn had a crush on Emily Davenport and asked her to the freshman year homecoming dance right in front of him, even though he hardly knew the girl. The guy who had taken the lead in the play that Flynn thought he had deserved.

“We didn’t,” Eve admitted. “One of the actors took it a-”

“Who was it? It was Lamia, wasn’t it? She was so mad that I walked in on her and Cassandra in the booth last week, but it wasn’t like I did it on purpose! Or Lance? He hates me because I don’t let him copy my notes in French class. Or-”

Eve put up a hand to stop him from going through his list of people that had it out for him that was sure to be the entire cast.

“It was Morgan.”

“Of course!” Flynn exclaimed. “I don’t know what she’s going to do after graduation. She’ll probably follow me to college just to torment me there, too!”

“Flynn, I’m sorry. I managed to get it from her and I wanted to give it right back to you, but Sam wanted to take it to Mrs. Ford. But I made sure none of them looked inside. I didn’t think they would take your ‘constructive criticisms’ so well.”

He looked at her. Maybe she really was different. Anyone else would have thrown him to the wolves without a second thought.

“Thank you for that, then,” he said.

“You didn’t get in too much trouble, did you? Because I could tell Mrs. Ford what really happened. It’s been eating at me all day. I’ll tell her right now.”

“No, Eve, don’t worry about it. It’s already over and you shouldn’t give up your friends because of me.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “They aren’t my friends. I don’t have friends.”

Flynn rolled his eyes and took an annoyed step away from her. “You think you’re cool because you ‘don’t have friends’? That’s stupid. You wouldn’t think it was so cool if it wasn’t your choice to not have any friends.”

“I never said it was _cool_. That’s just how it is. God, you _are_ an asshole.”

She marched back inside and Flynn hadn’t thought it was possible, but he felt even worse than he had before.

* * *

With a week before their show opening, Sam was _barely_ off book and was still forgetting most of his blocking. The kid playing Banquo had gotten the flu and Mrs. Ford was practically force-feeding him some special soup that a friend of hers made. The techies were in a crazed hurry to redo one of the sets because the original one hadn’t been properly secured to its batten and fell down. Mrs. Ford had gone into a frenzy about it being the curse of the Scottish Play and made everyone do the cleansing ritual, then ended rehearsals early for the day just to get all the negative energy out.

Rehearsals went later into the night now and everyone was a bit cranky. Their meal/homework break was now more of a nap break and people fought over the comfiest areas to sleep. All of the couches and chairs backstage from past productions were prime real estate. No one even cared how many years they had been there for.

Recently, Mrs. Ford had tasked Flynn with the job of putting together their playbill. She usually did it herself, but with everyone being so tired and irritable, attitudes towards Flynn had only gotten worse and she took the opportunity to get him away from everybody else. He was smart and he knew it, which resulted in him thinking he could run everything and be the boss of everybody. The boy had annoyed her greatly at first, but she had recently realized that he had quite a lot in common with her husband and he had turned out to be a good man (albeit a bit of a wanker sometimes), so she viewed Flynn’s eccentricities a bit more fondly now.

Flynn was working through that day’s break, as he almost always did, carrying a stack of freshly printed papers to put the playbills together in the classroom. Lance Dulaque was walking through the room as he passed and seized the opportunity, sticking his foot out to trip Flynn and send the papers fluttering about the room. Everyone sitting backstage had a perfect view through the large open doorway and cracked up as Flynn raised himself to his knees and looked at the mess around him.

Cassandra, the redheaded costume girl who still apologized to Eve every time she saw her about the day with the pins, smacked her girlfriend on the arm with a harsh look and went to go help Flynn. Lamia sputtered to the girl’s back.


	3. Act III

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you haven't watched the show or picked up on the little hints I've dropped yet, there is a subtle Leverage crossover in this. Mrs. Ford is the love of my life, Sophie Devereaux (Ford now, obviously) and the rest of the crew makes a brief appearance in this chapter. Just thought I'd clear that up in case you haven't seen the show and are wondering why I mentioned these people.

Those final few days of rehearsals had everyone in a frenzy. When one crisis was averted or fixed, another sprung up. Their Banquo was back in good health, but now their Hecate was fumbling over lines that she had learned weeks before because their Hecate was Lamia and she was becoming increasingly distraught with every passing day that Cassandra ignored her. The broken set had been redone, but the bulb in one of the lighting fixtures burned out and the lighting techies were freaking out because the replacement could take up to two weeks to come in. Mrs. Ford said that she would take care of it, though, and the very next day there was a new bulb. (Coincidentally, another high school’s bulb vanished overnight only to return five days later, after _Macbeth_ had finished its run.)

Cassandra had taken to following Flynn around. She gladly skipped out on her costuming duties and helped him, putting the playbills together and hanging posters all around the school. He had been rather suspicious of her at first, thinking that it was just a ploy to get close and then do something awful to him, but the bouncy sophomore girl was actually very sweet.

The others had started to lay off of him since Cassandra began tagging along with him, mostly because they knew if they messed with her in the slightest there would be hell to pay from Lamia.

* * *

On the day of their opening, a folded up piece of paper landed on Eve’s desk during history class. She opened it in her lap, keeping an eye on the teacher as he droned on about the Industrial Revolution.

_Skip 7 th, meet me in the booth. Opening night celebration.  
\- Sam_

Eve looked over her right shoulder, where he sat diagonally behind her. He gave her a thumbs up.

She made her way to the theater building instead of her seventh period at the end of the day, going in through the backstage door instead of the classroom one to avoid Mrs. Ford spotting her. Flynn was there and running into him was probably just as bad as running into the teacher, but he had let her off the hook for something once. Maybe it would happen again.

“What are you doing here?” they both asked at the same time.

“Mrs. Ford called me out of class to work on stuff for this evening,” he answered her first. “What are _you_ doing here?”

Eve shrugged. “Sam asked me to meet him upstairs to celebrate opening night.”

“Yeah, I’m sure he did,” Flynn said under his breath, looking away from her.

“What was that?”

“He’s using you! I thought you were smart enough to see things like that, but whatever. Do whatever you want, just don’t mess up any of the equipment up there.”

Eve scoffed in offense. She wasn’t stupid. That was one thing she had always been defensive about.

“Fuck you, Flynn,” she spat and stomped off across the stage, through the house, and to the stairs that led up to the booth.

* * *

Curtain went up in thirty minutes and the shrieking of the two-person makeup crew made Flynn’s stomach tense up. What was wrong _now_? He had already had to deal with too much that day.

He approached their area, certain that he had gotten several premature white hairs just from that day, but he did not have to get close at all to see what the problem was. The bright lights of the little vanity table showed off the dark purple bruise on Sam’s cheek.

Flynn’s jaw dropped.

“They’re gonna need a lot of concealer for that,” a voice said beside him.

Eve was already in her gown, which was dark red with long, flowy sleeves. Her hair was pulled into a bun and she wore a delicate golden circlet crown with a beautiful red jewel that Mrs. Ford had made her promise to take good care of (which gave Eve the alarming suspicion that it wasn’t made of plastic like the other crowns were).

Flynn had already felt faint thinking about how he was going to tell Mrs. Ford that her star was going to be going onstage with a large purple splotch on his face and the sight of Eve all dressed up beside him did not help. He went a little weak in the knees and she must have noticed because she immediately looked concerned.

“Are you alright? You look a little pale.”

Turning his head back to where Sam was wincing as one of the makeup girls dabbed concealer all over his bruise, Flynn started babbling incoherently.

“Wha- What? What… What ha-”

“What happened?” Eve supplied and Flynn nodded his head. “What happened is I punched him in the face.”

“You…did _that_?”

She crossed her arms, the excess fabric of her sleeves dangling down, and grinned proudly.

“Eve!” Flynn exclaimed, then lowered his voice. “Eve, you could get _suspended_ for that!”

She shook her head. “I won’t. He won’t tell anybody it was me because I would tell on him for bringing booze to school.”

“ _What?_ ”

“Okay, you look like you’re gonna pass out. Let’s sit you down.”

There was a little metal folding chair by the pulleys for the curtains and Eve guided him over to it with a hand between his shoulders. After he took a few breaths, she asked if he was alright to hear the rest of her story or if he needed an inhaler or something. He said that he was fine.

“Well, first off, you were right about Sam. He was just trying to get in my pants. He even had a blanket laid out on the floor like he honestly expected me to do it with him right there.” Her face wrinkled up in disgust at the thought, then she continued on. “But he had snuck some beers out of his house and tried to get me to have a celebratory drink with him. I _told him_ that if he touched me, I would punch him. It’s not my fault he didn’t believe me.”

Flynn tilted his head as he looked at her standing over him, hands on her hips and a shameless smirk on her face. This girl sure was something else.

She looked over her shoulder at the two girls working to cover up the mark she had left on Sam’s face.

“I kind of wish I hadn’t decked him in the face, though,” she said. “Just for the sake of the show. Mrs. Ford is gonna freak. I should’ve just kicked him in the balls.”

Flynn instinctively covered his own lap defensively just at the thought. He was certain that Eve could do some pretty bad damage down there, especially with those heavy shoes of hers.

“I’m sorry he treated you that way,” he said when she looked back at him.

“You tried to warn me. I was just too stubborn to listen. You…you were a good friend.”

Eve hadn’t been able to look at him when she said it. She focused on the toes of the black flats that stuck out from under her dress as she continued.

“I’m an army brat; I move a lot. I’ve lived in Germany, New Mexico, Kentucky, Hawaii, Arizona, Virginia, and now Oregon. You said that it was my choice to not have friends and that’s true, but it’s a way of survival for me. Saying goodbye to people sucks, so I try to make it so I don’t have anyone to say goodbye to. But, um, I wouldn’t mind saying goodbye to you. Wait…that didn’t sound the way I meant it t-”

“It’s okay. I get it,” he interrupted her. “Thank you for telling me. I wouldn’t mind it, either.”

Eve finally looked up at him, relief evident across her features. He couldn’t help the smile that spread across his face and it was infectious.

“Have you looked?” she asked, pointing to the closed curtain next to them.

Flynn shook his head. “Too nervous.”

“Why are _you_ nervous? You don’t have to go on stage and say words that are thousands of years old.”

“I’m responsible for everything going on behind the scenes while the show is happening. I’d be less nervous if I was acting, believe me. I actually tried out to be Macbeth, but…it didn’t work out, obviously.”

Eve pointed a finger at him with a gasp. “You said the M-word!”

“Don’t tell me you actually believe in that.”

“Of course not. There’s no such thing as curses or magic. And, besides, it’s way too cold to go running outside right now. This stays between us. Now, come on.”

She held out her hand and when Flynn took it, she tugged him up out of the chair. They went over to the edge of the curtain and pulled it aside enough for them to peek through.

Eve spotted her mother in the front row, chatting to the woman beside her. Her little brother, who was holding a bouquet of flowers in his lap, caught her looking and they waved to each other.

Flynn asked her where her family was and she pointed them out.

“Uh…my mom is talking to your mom.”

“Must be fate,” Eve said, knocking him playfully with her elbow.

She watched as the seat next to her brother was taken by a blonde woman. She had entered with two other men – one tall and black, the other one white with dark hair to his shoulders. They both tried sitting down in the same seat and immediately began bickering until an older man approached and gave them a look that made them stop.

“What’s wrong?” Flynn asked as a look of disappointment fell across Eve’s face.

Normally, she would have shook her head and said it was nothing, but she was reminded herself that she was trying this friend thing out again.

“Looks like my dad couldn’t make it. He told me he might not be able to, but I hoped that he would.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. We’re open for four more nights anyway.”

They stepped back from the curtain and let it fall shut again. Mrs. Ford was striding through the backstage area announcing they had five minutes until the curtain went up and calling for everyone to get ready.

“See you later?” Eve asked uncertainly.

Flynn nodded. “Break a leg.”

She reached down to squeeze his hand then ran off to join the other actors.

* * *

Flynn was the last one to exit after the show and he hadn’t even taken two whole steps out of the door before his mother was squeezing his cheeks in her hands and kissing him on the forehead repeatedly.

“It was wonderful, sweetheart! You did such an amazing job!”

“ _Mom_ ,” he whined, which was uncharacteristic for him. Out of all the things that his classmates had made fun of him for over the years, the one thing he never took offense to was them teasing him about his mother.

Margie pulled back, but kept holding him by the shoulders, then followed his gaze behind her and suddenly it made sense.

“Ah, it’s a girl.”

“ _Mom_ ,” Flynn said again.

A voice called out his name and Eve came running up, carrying the roses that her family had gotten her. She felt her face grow warm when she realized she had stopped, panting a little bit and smiling at Flynn, right in front of his mother.

“Eve, right?” Margie asked and the girl nodded. “I met your mother before the show. You were just spectacular tonight.”

“Thank you,” Eve replied.

“Flynn, I’m going to go wait in the car. Don’t be too long.”

She started walking towards the parking lot and an awkward silence fell over the two teens for a moment.

“You really were great,” Flynn said.

“Thanks.”

Her gaze was directed down at her flowers, then she looked up, but when her eyes met his she immediately looked down again. Why was talking to Flynn right now making her stomach flutter more than going onstage had?

Luckily for the two of them in that moment, someone else approached, though it was an unlikely someone. Lamia.

“Flynn,” she said, “I want to apologize to you. We treat you like shit and then hate you when you’re mean to us in return. It’s stupid and not fair.”

Flynn was absolutely flabbergasted. Eve spotted a certain redhead a little ways away watching them.

“Did Cassandra make you say this?” she asked.

“Kind of,” Lamia admitted. “But she made me realize that it was wrong. I really am sorry, Flynn.”

“Thank you. And I’m glad you and Cassandra made up. She missed you.”

Lamia smiled, told Flynn and Eve she would see them later, and then rejoined Cassandra. They linked hands and headed towards Lamia’s car.

“So –”

Eve was interrupted by her brother. “Dad just finished work. He wants to meet us out for dinner.”

“Okay, just tell Mom I need another minute.”

The boy, who looked thirteen or fourteen, looked between his sister and Flynn for a moment, then narrowed his eyes at Flynn and crossed his arms over his chest in a way that he probably meant to seem menacing.

“Jake, if you don’t walk away in the next three seconds…,” Eve growled.

He stalked back over to their mother.

“Sorry about him. He thinks he’s tough,” Eve said once Jake was gone. “I guess I need to be going, though.”

“Yeah, me too. My mom’s waiting.”

But neither of them made to walk away. Eve hated herself for it because this was the first friend she had had in a long time, but she had the overwhelming urge to kiss him. Instead, she pulled one of the roses out of her bouquet, snapped off most of the end, and stuck the flower in the buttonhole of the baggy blazer he had worn that day.

“Goodnight, Flynn,” she said quickly and walked back to her family.

“Goodnight, Eve,” he said to himself and gently touched the rose sticking out of his jacket.


	4. Act IV

It was basically the same for the next three nights. They would spend downtime before nightly performances together and talk for a few minutes after the shows. They were only with each other for maybe an hour a day, but Eve _knew_ it. She _liked_ him. And it was stupid and pointless and obviously one-sided because the only guys who were ever interested in her were jerks like Sam who thought she was easy to hook up with.

Everyone raved about how amazing Eve was in the play, but only Flynn knew just how amazing she was offstage too and that made him feel like the luckiest person in the world. She was funny and caring and had all kinds of interesting stories about all the places she had lived and visited with her family because of her dad’s rank in the army – stories that she had never told anybody besides him. It made no sense to him why she had chosen _him_ of all people to be the one she wanted to share all of this with, but he was grateful. And he ignored the slight dizziness he had in his head whenever he was around her, or even just thought about her when he wasn’t around her, because there was no way that this pretty, spirited girl would ever have any feelings for him other than platonic. Flynn was fine with that (unless he thought about it for too long) because being her friend already made him feel so special that he didn’t dare let whatever else he may be feeling get in the way. 

* * *

It was a tradition, Flynn and Eve learned, for the theater kids to all go out to eat at IHOP after the final show. Neither had a car, so they got a ride with Lamia and Cassandra. The girls joined them at the restaurant, too, which put them at ease because the idea of sitting alone at a table, no matter how not-romantic the setting was, had been dangerous to the feelings both of them had spent the last few days suppressing.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone so happy to be at an IHOP,” Eve commented as Cassandra excitedly flipped through the menu.

“Breakfast food is her favorite,” Lamia explained.

“Ooh!” the redhead exclaimed with an enthusiastic hand gesture. “They have smiley face pancakes! That’s so cute!”

“Those are for children.”

Cassandra’s shoulders drooped and her smile faded.

Her girlfriend sighed. “Unless you want them.”

* * *

When it came time to leave, Cassandra and Lamia walked off ahead. Eve stood up from the booth and as Flynn scooted himself out from the farther seat in, something fell out of his jacket pocket. It was a crumpled rose that was starting to get dried and crispy on the tips of the petals. It was the rose she had given him on opening night. She looked down at it and Flynn stammered for something to say, clearly embarrassed.

“You kept it with you,” she said softly.

He nodded, swallowing nervously.

Eve set one hand down on the table as she leaned over and placed the tips of her fingers gently underneath Flynn’s chin. She tilted his head upwards and kissed him testingly. He froze up against her and she pulled back, a sinking feeling in her chest as she realized she had made a mistake, but Flynn cupped her cheek with one hand and moved back in with such a surprising force that she fell on one knee back onto the seat.

Distantly, they heard someone yell out, “Oh, my God! Everybody look!”

There was loud whooping and then a hollering of, “GET IT, NERD!”

They pulled apart, breaking the sticky seal of their lips that had been made by the syrup. Flynn’s eyes took a few extra seconds to flutter open.

“Wow,” he breathed.

Eve tucked a bit of hair behind one of her ears, which were hot on the tips, and wrapped one of her hands around his.

“Come on. Cass and Lamia are waiting. Also, there are about forty pairs of eyes on us right now.”

Flynn nodded and they shuffled out of the booth connected at the hands, looking at no one else as they exited the restaurant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all of the kudos and kind comments on this! :)


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